Friday, 25 July 2008

To The Harbourmaster

Since Frank O'Hara died on this day in 1966 - struck down by a beach buggy on Fire Island - let's have this beautiful poem, the one that John Ashbery, fighting back the tears, read at O'Hara's funeral.
Posted by at

5 comments:

  1. Uncle Dick Madeley25 July 2008 at 18:28

    One of my favourite poets, Nige. Didn't realise that about today. You've clearly been using that literary almanac that Judy bought your Christmas.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Nige25 July 2008 at 18:35

    I'd be lost without it Dick. Very thoughtful of her. Hope that knee of hers is mending. Enjoy the prawns!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Uncle Dick Madeley25 July 2008 at 19:05

    Ah, Nige, the knee! So much to write about the knee in the coming days. Even you, the arch knee-man of all knee-men, will be sick of the sight of Judy's knee before I'm done. The might even be a poem on the subject before Monday.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous25 July 2008 at 22:29

    I love "the tattered cordage of my will..." Fantastic. Cut the painter.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Anonymous25 July 2008 at 22:32

    PS: A grad school classmate of mine wrote the first bio of O'Hara and it's good. Can't remember the title, but my friend's name is Brad Gooch. He was smarter than me. I wrote a theorized dissertation that only rarified periodicals would want to publish, he wrote a popular book.

    Here's the thing. If you want to succeed as a writer, you can't listen to your teachers in the academy. That's the moral of that story and I learned it late.

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)